Posts Tagged ‘1940’

PEOPLE have lost their freedom from time to time down thru the long centuries. But they have never failed to regret that loss and to strive to regain liberty.

The world has changed, the editors of “Das Reich,” a Berlin newspaper, seems to believe. For this paper is urging the people of the Netherlands and of Scandinavia to “cease regretting their lost freedom and be glad to join the German Reich …”

People are stubborn about things like that. They may be conquered. They may be held down by military occupation. They may be denied freedom.

But the longing for lost freedom is something that is not so easily removed as a pair of tonsils. It lies down deep in man, out of reach of the surgeon’s knife — or even of the bayonet.

Today is the 153rd anniversary of signing of the Constitution of the United States. On this day in `1787, some thirty odd members of the Constitutional Convention, sitting in Philadelphia, affixed their signatures to the document with which few, if any of them were satisfied, but which they believed was the best upon which the majority could agree.

Even George Washington, who presided over the meeting, was dubious as to whether the constitution would be adopted by the thirteen states; and even if adopted, he had little faith in its permanence.

How much better the makers of the constitution wrought then they themselves anticipated!

Today there exists not an instrument of government anywhere which is more strongly entrenched in the affections of the people; nor is there one which gives so much promise of enduring in a world in flux and revolution.

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The document was born out of a great national crisis.

The thirteen colonies successfully had won their political independence from Great Britain, but they had failed utterly to achieve national unity. On the contrary, the drift was steadily toward disunion, civil war and anarchy.

The Articles of Confederation made what national government there was both feeble, incompetent and futile.

A few of the more far sighted among the leaders — Washington, Madison, Hamilton and Franklin, among others — saw the imperative necessity for action if the country were to be saved, and thus it was that the governors of twelve states were prevailed upon to appoint delegates to consider revision of the Articles of Confederation.

That was their instructions.

But happily for us the delegates voted to disregard these instructions and drew up an entirely new constitution for the United States.

_____

Nor is it fair to those who wrote the constitution to say that their prevailing temper was conservative — that the aim they had in view was not only to secure the unity of the country, but to assure the security of property as well.

Perhaps the frankest statement as to this prevailing view came from Roger Sherman, who said:

The people should have as little to do as may be with the government.

Thus it was that when the constitution was completed some twenty delegates refused to sign it and it was denounced by such famed patriots as Patrick Henry and old Sam Adams as “a rich man’s document.”

_____

This fear of the dangers of “mob government” or too much control by the “masses” is evident to even the casual student of the work of the convention.

The president was not to be chosen by the people, neither were the senators. To select the former an electoral college was set up, which theoretically was to be composed of the best men in each state who in turn would meet and choose with deliberation and care the man best suited to be president. Of course, it only worked that way in the first two elections. But senators continued to be named by the state legislatures until after the turn of the present century.

The president’s power was curbed by provisions that all treaties should be subject to the test of a two thirds vote of the senate, while all appointments were made subject to senate confirmation.

The president, however, could put a check on both houses of congress through the veto power, while wide but deliberately vague authority was given to a powerful judiciary appointed for life.

Moreover, in the original draft there was no Bill of Rights, no protection for freedom of speech, the practice of religion and the press.

It was Thomas Jefferson who refused to give his support to the constitution unless a pledge were given that the Bill of Rights would be incorporated as soon as possible after the new government was established, which was done.

_____

The constitution has proved its worth through the years. It has provided security for property, but also has safeguarded human rights. Today it is the beacon light of freedom in a world over much of which has spread the darkness of totalitarianism.

It is the hope of Democracy in a world where despots sneer at popular government as decadent and hopeless.

As we ourselves sustain and support the constitution we shall prove these despots to be liars and frauds; and thus hasten the day when the ideals of liberty which it enshrines shall once more become the common heritage of humanity.

The 1940 Federal census is more than 40 per cent complete in Fayette and Somerset counties, according to Ralph C. Kennedy, district census supervisor, with headquarters in the National Bank & Trust Company building at Brimstone Corner.

“From all indications, the census should be completed in Connellsville next week but the work in the rural areas will not be completed until the end of the month,” he said.

Although complete returns have not been tabulated, a hurried examination of the records reveal that approximately 125,000 persons have already been tabulated in the two counties, the supervisor declared, with Fayette county having nearly 95,000 in that total.

“It appears that the enumerators are averaging about 10,000 persons a day, which is quite a job. This figure, however, is certain to go down when the canvassers strike the less populous districts. A continuation of the fine cooperation the workers have been receiving will east the big job before them. In many cases, re-calls may be avoided if the head of the household will leave necessary information at home to pass on to the enumerator,” Mr. Kennedy said.

He added that regardless of where a person may live, he or she will be enumerated during the decennial canvass. Persons who were living as of 11:59 P.M. Sunday night, March 31, are included although they may have died since that time. Births after that hour, however, are not to be tabulated in the 1940 census.

Mr. Kennedy pointed out the enumerators expect to find quite a few persons in Fayette and Somerset counties living in coke ovens, caves, piano boxes, garages and other places but all of these are to be embraced in the tabulation.

The Daily Courier (Connellsville, Pennsylvania) Apr 13, 1940

There were 575,250 unemployed persons in Pennsylvania during the final week of March, 1940, according to U.S. census figures recently released. This represented about 14 per cent of the State’s available labor, compared to a 9.7 percentage in the Nation as a whole. Since March the total of unemployed has shown a considerable decline in Pennsylvania.

Man Was Bitten By His Own False Teeth And Somebody Stole Kansas City Lamp Post

NEW YORK, March 31. — (AP) — Somebody stole a lamp post . . . a cop tagged his wife’s car . . . and a man was bitten by his own false teeth — and that’s no April Fool!

It all happened in last week’s International Cavalcade of Cockeyed Occurrences, chronicled and catalogued herewith in your weekly Goofy Gazette.

The affair of the false teeth occurred this way: A Chicago man slipped off a bench, his store molars flew out of his mouth, ricocheted off his forehead, and — just plain bit him.

The cop who had the nerve to tag his wife was Officer Guy Barnes of Rochester, Minn. Take a bow, Mr. Barnes!

The theft of the lamp post occurred in Kansas City, and there just isn’t any explanation. You never can tell — some Atlantic City, N.J., thieves stole enough sleeping powders to put away 30,000 insomniacs!

A French soldier was discovered marching to the front pushing his equipment in a baby carriage . . . the 20 members of the Boston city council inadvertently cast 22 votes . . . and an Eastport, Md., hen on Easter laid an egg containing a yolk, a white, and — another egg!

Exasperation dept: A St. Louis man got so sore talking to a girl on the telephone that he ripped out the receiver . . . a Newport News, Va., man got so mad waiting while somebody monopolized a pay telephone that he smashed the door in . . . and after snowplows repeatedly buried his mail box, an Ashland, Me., farmer nailed it onto a barn gable and put a ladder there — for the mailman to climb!

The New York City education board pronounced a teacher a fire hazard on the ground she weighed 275 pounds and was liable to block doorways . . . while a Washington policeman was reading an advertisement about a lost cat the cat walked into the police station . . . and when a Muncie, Ind., man had a tree cut down so it wouldn’t fall on his house, it — fell on his house!

In Cleveland, Miss., a prisoner in the jail there fashioned a revolver out of soap — and it DIDN’T fool the jailer.

NEW YORK, Feb, 2. — Professor William G. Sumner, of Yale college, delivered a lecture last night before the Brooklyn Revenue Reform club, at the Long Island Historical Society building. His subject was “The Forgotten Man.” Professor Sumner said that the forgotten man was the simple, honest man, who earned his living by good hard work, paid his debts, kept his contracts and educated his children. He was passed by and forgotten because he did his duty patiently and without complaint. On him rested all the burdens engendered by paupers, vagrants, spendthrifts, criminals and jobbers. All legislation which tended to relieve the weak, the vicious and the negligent to the consequences of their faults threw those consequences upon theforgotten man.

Wealth comes only from production, and all that the wrangling grabbers, loafers and robbers get to deal with comes from somebody’s toil and sacrifice. Who, then, is he who provides it all? Go and find him, and you will have once more before you the Forgotten Man. You will find him hard at work because he has a great many to support. Nature has done a great deal for him in giving him a fertile soil and an excellent climate, and he wonders why it is that, after all, his scale of comfort is so moderate. He has to get out of the soil enough to pay all his taxes, and that means the cost of all the jobs and the fund for all the plunder. The Forgotten Man is delving away in patient industry, supporting his family, paying his taxes, casting his vote, supporting the church and school, reading his newspaper and cheering for the politicians of his admiration, but he is the only one for whom there is no provision in the great scramble and the big divide. Such is the Forgotten Man. He works, he votes, generally he prays — but he always pays — yes, above all, he pays.

Denton Journal (Denton, Maryland) Dec 23, 1922

Don’t Think – Just Vote the Straight Ticket!

Coshocton Tribune (Coshocton, Ohio) Nov 6, 1932

“The Forgotten Man” is that individual who does an honest day’s work, pays his bills, brings up three or four children, indulges in a pipe or an occasional cigar, keeps up a small savings account, never asks for charity from anyone, never gets into trouble with the police, never makes a speech or writes a letter to the city editor — in short he’s the individual who keeps going on his own momentum, good times, bad times.
When the hat is passed around for the down-and-outers, or those lads who have lost $4.90 by some cruel, heartless flapper, the “Forgotten Man” chips in his mite.

The tax collector visits the “Forgotten Man” regularly, and collects toll for the upkeep of the police courts, jails, workhouses, and poor houses — none of which the “Forgotten Man” ever uses. He is self-supporting, self starting, self-sufficient, and being so he is counted in on nothing except the census. But in that document he cuts a big figure because he probably forms the vast majority.

— Harold the Imaginer.

Appleton Post Crescent (Appleton, Wisconsin) Feb 25, 1929

LONG-SUFFERING LANDLORDS

In commiserating the “forgotten man,” an observant citizen suggests why overlook the forgotten landlord? He, too, in this painful period, may well be an object of sympathy. Often, too, of admiration.

There is still too much remaining of the tradition which represents a landlord as a ruthless old skinflint, who probably got his property dishonestly and who rejoices in any pretext to gouge rent out of a poor tenant, or to turn a sick family out into the cold. There have been, and are, such landlords, but certainly in these days they are exceptional.

The owner of a house or a farm today is lucky if he is getting enough out of the property to pay the taxes and mortgage charges, without any income on his investment. In almost any town there may be found hundreds of rented homes where, because the tenants are out of work, the owner is carrying them along for half their usual rental or for nothing at all, because he has not the heart to turn them out. Many a family has skimped and saved and put its savings into a house or two for renting, to help safeguard its own future, is as badly off as the tenants who never saved in good times. All in all, honest inquiry will probably show that landlords as a class have been behaving pretty handsomely.

Daily Mail (Hagerstown, Maryland) Oct 11, 1932

But Ain’t We Got Beer?

THINKING OUT LOUD

Why is our prolific and prolix correspondent Jone Howlind, so incensed at the decidedly dubious prospects of the new deal? I presume she voted for the egregious F.D.R., and certainly has been an advocate of repeal. Her letter in Friday’s Post is inconsistent with former letters.

Surely, prices are rising over the moon and the average person is being ground between the upper and nether millstones. What does that matter? We’ve got beer, and “hard likker” is in sight.

The many will continue to be sacrificed for the few and the hungry and ragged are increasing. Never mind — we’ve got beer!
Beer puts some men to work. The wet papers sedulously refrain from reporting the men who lose their jobs in the candy and soft drink and allied industries.

The well known “Boobus Americanus” with his propensity for following and believing the demagogue, turned out of office a wise, far seeing statesman and elected a man whose own neighbors refused to vote for him.

Now the “forgotten man” is still forgotten; thy new deal is the same old deal; the specter of anarchy rides the minds; the Blue Eagle is only a plucked pigeon, but “sing you sinners, sing” — we got beer!

MRS. EVELYN FORTT
4130 Pera

El Paso Herald-Post (El Paso, Texas) Sep 13, 1933

Roosevelt and Wall St.

THINKING OUT LOUD:

The Herald-Post editorial on the Farley-Pecora move was splendid, although I must confess I thought parts of it a trifle naive in view of the fact that while Farley gets Pecora removed from conducting his investigations of the crooked operations of Wall Street bankers, two more Wall Street men take up office in Washington.

I refer to James Bruce, now financial advisor to the Board of the Home Loan Bank, erstwhile vice president of the Chase National bank under Mr. Wiggin, and George Lindsay, fiscal agent of the Home Loan Bank Board, lately vice president of the Blancamerica – Blair Corp.

I can, by stretching my imagination, credit a newspaper with being naive about such a situation, but I can’t stretch it far enough to include Mr. Roosevelt. Consequently, what seems “new” about the “New Deal” is that the Wall Street operators are now operating in Washington where in the old deal they operated in Wall Street.

I advise anyone who doubts this to go over the old newspaper files of the early summer showing the corporations through which the House of Morgan stretched its influence and the lists of Morgan beneficiaries and with these lists check Roosevelt’s appointments. count ’em yourselves. The information isn’t hidden. The strength of politicians lies in the short memories of the public.

I think the Herald-Post’s optimism in regard to Roosevelt’s ability to keep hold of the Progressives was more a case of the wish being father to the thought than anything else. The public may be ignorant as to the character and background of the men with whom Roosevelt has surrounded himself by choice, but it can hardly be thought that the leaders of the Progressives are not perfectly aware of the personnel of the entire set-up. Their stand, therefore, will not be a case of ignorance, but a test of their weakness or strength of character.

Will the “forgotten man” be not only forgotten, but deserted by all as well?

JONE HOWLIND.

El Paso Herald-Post (El Paso, Texas) Oct 10, 1933

“The Forgotten Man”

THINKING OUT LOUD

We have been watching the administration of the “New Deal,” and have seen how the “Forgotten Man” — the banker, manufacturer, jobber and retail merchant have been remembered. We wondered, naturally, if another class of citizens who seem to be having a hard time “carving” a name for themselves on the torso of humanity, would likewise be “remembered.”

I make special reference to the “25,000 doctors out of a job” which the press mentioned as a surplus of the profession a few months ago. We felt worried about the future of these poor souls, when realizing that they are slaves to “medical ethics” and can not advertise the skill with which they can do human carving or puncture you with a hypodermic needle.

But thanks to the faithful press for informing us that prospects for their relief is in sight, as soon as congress convenes. Rex Tugwell, assistant secretary of agriculture under the guise of protecting the innocent from poisonous, harmful and mislabeled patent medicines, and habit-forming drugs, proposes (in a bill he has prepared for consideration of congress) to place our precious lives wholly in the hands of the medical doctor.

It seems that the doctor has for several years felt himself slipping from his exalted position of holding a monopoly on the lives of mankind. In the first place his business is regularly called “practice,” and it seems he has followed it so diligently in the trimming of human “giblets” and bank rolls that the people are leaving him in a manner most alarming. This fact is set forth in an article in the Literary Digest of Sept. 22, 1923 [maybe 1933?], wherein a certain member of the A.M.A. set about to find out why they were their patients who had not died under treatment.

Several thousand citizens were accosted on the street, street cars, offices, etc., and asked two questions: “What would you do if you got sick, and why?”

He found that over 90 per cent would not call a doctor. In his paper read before the A.M.A. convention, he recommended that the doctor be not quite so ethical and treat his profession as a business and “get the money;” that a campaign be instituted through the press, for education of the gullible humans, and to admonish them to “see their doctor first.”

There are many people who sincerely believe that mutilation of the body by surgical operation is sinful.

Whenever you give an organization of people a monopoly over lives or rights of others, you have destroyed respect for the law that created such monopoly, and created contempt for those who enjoy such special privileges.

The number of people who die under medical and surgical treatment are several thousand fold greater than those who succumb from home remedies.

I am for a law that will take away the monopolistic powers already granted the doctor and give the individual a course of commonsense instruction in food, cleanliness, habits of living.

Over three billion dollars is the annual doctor bill, besides the loss of time from work. This becomes an economic problem besides the question of relief from suffering.

So, who is forgotten?

LOUIS BOND CHERRY.

El Paso Herald-Post (El Paso, Texas) Nov 3, 1933

Daily Inter Lake (Kalispell, Montana) Nov 8, 1932

The Forgotten Man

THINKING OUT LOUD:

We will let the gold and silver rust
And pledge our faith to the brain trust
If they will unfold a plan
To help the long forgotten man.

In honest sweat he toils for years
With fondest hopes and sadest fears
Now on the brink of dark despair
In nature’s bounty he cannot share.

Hungry, ragged, bare-foot and cold
He possesses not silver nor gold
Still believing “the Lord will provide”
But knowing mankind must divide.

Let us hope they will find a way
To bring to us a brighter day
Spreading happiness, spreading health,
Learn us that gold is not wealth!

PROVIDENCE, R.I., (AP). The Rev. Charles E. Coughlin declared that under the new deal “the forgotten man has been remembered” in time to pay the government’s bills. He spoke at an outdoor rally which he said was attended by 25,000 persons.

“With the new deal the forgotten man has been remembered,” he declared, “because every gallon of gas you buy, every pound of butter, every loaf of bread, all your groceries and drugs, have posted on them a mortgage to the United States in favor of international bankers.” He made his statement after saying “one day out of every three you work is taken out of your payroll for hidden taxes.”

NEW BEDFORD, (AP). The Rev. Charles E. Coughlin, discussing the administration of President Roosevelt, declared: “As I was instrumental in removing Herbert Hoover from the white house, so help me God, I will be instrumental in taking a communist from the chair once occupied by Washington.”

Evening State Journal (Lincoln, Nebraska) Aug 3, 1936

I hear Spain’s nice this time of year.

ILL CHOSEN.

Ackley (Ia.) World-Journal: For a man who has talked about the “forgotten man” as much as Roosevelt, it comes with very poor grace to go on a cruise that costs the American people half a million dollars; it comes with even poorer grace to include his three sons, the “crown prince,” the “heir apparent” and another in waiting.

Evening State Journal (Lincoln, Nebraska) Aug 11, 1936

NEW TAX COMING.

Jan. 1 will usher in the era of short pay checks. One percent will be deducted by order of the new deal. The forgotten man will be remembered by a new tax. The little fellow will pony up. One percent will be the deduction. It will affect the payrolls of thousands of industries and the well being of millions. Not content with the present tax rate, where it is figured that the average citizen gives one day’s pay out of every week for government, another one-hundredth of what the people earn is to be deducted from individual earnings for government use. It will be paid to the government and retained for the use of new deal administrators, and perhaps for the establishment of new bureaus to help to administer the funds that will be collected. The benevolent touch of a paternal government will be felt in a new effort with the beginning of 1937.

If at any time in the future the law should be repealed or declared unconstitutional that will not end the expense that has been incurred. Like the NRA and the FERA it will live on and on, the organization set up for its administration will continue and the government will pay the bill.

This is one of the new taxes made necessary by new deal management of public affairs. The tax may not be so obnoxious as the bureaucracy which it will help to enlarge and the complexity it will add to government.

Evening State Journal (Lincoln, Nebraska) Oct 19, 1936

El Paso Herald-Post (El Paso, Texas) Jul 5, 1933

A BIT INCONSISTENT

Time marches on! And today we find the federal government doing the things for which it condemned private citizens only three or four years ago. Such as, for example, foreclosing mortgages on the homes of persons unable to meet their interest and principle payments. It’s a strange world.

It is only good business, we suppose, for the Home Owners Loan corporation (a federal agency) to get its money when due. But, as we witness the numerous foreclosures by the HOLC, we recall the bitter denunciations, a few years ago, of private individuals who did the same thing. State governments then passed moratorium laws, making it impossible for mortgage holders to foreclose. And the moratoriums undoubtedly gave temporary relief to many farm and home owners. We found no fault with them then; we find no fault now. But, it would seem that the federal government now would practice what it preached to private lenders back in 1934-1935. If it is wrong for a private to put a man out of his home, it also is wrong for the government.

In Lyon county, right now, a man and wife who have passed middle age are losing their home, upon which they gave a mortgage to HOLC several years ago. The mortgage is due — and HOLC wants its money, or else. Or else the couple moves into the street. The HOLC, as we get the story, refuses to compromise. Although the couple is able to raise half of the amount now due, HOLC officials have declared they want “all or nothing”.

It is a bitter awakening for those trusting souls who have been led to believe that the Man in Washington will chastise the bade, bad money-lenders and see the the “forgotten man” does not lose his home. The Lyon county couple to whom we have referred, as well as the rest of us, are beginning to realize that the grim realities of life are still with us; that they must be faced in the same old way. We are returning to the point where we again face such cold, hard facts as money borrowed, whether from private citizen or government, must be paid back. Also, that assurances of security by politicians seeking office often are merely a means of getting votes. Sad, but true.

Boyden Reporter (Boyden, Iowa) Oct 21, 1937

Boyden Reporter (Boyden, Iowa) May 14, 1942

National Debt Worries Farmers
[excerpt – Simon E. Lantz]

“Mr. Roosevelt promised to place the cost of government upon the shoulders of those most able to pay. In 1930, the wealth of the nation was paying 69 per cent of governmental costs and the laborers, farmers and common people were paying 31 per cent. But last year we found that the wealth of the nation was paying only 39 per cent while the ordinary people were paying 61 per cent. That is how Mr. Roosevelt took care of the forgotten man and soaked the rich.

Daily Inter Lake (Kalispell, Montana) Oct 24, 1940

WHITE COLLAR WORKER IS ‘THE FORGOTTEN MAN’

ON A BIG munitions plant being built with government money at Wilmington, Ill., carpenters are paid $25 a day; men trundling wheelbarrows or working with pick or shovel are paid $16 and $17 a day.

In Chicago, 50 miles away, the clerical forces working in the offices of business and industry are being paid from $17 to $35 a week.
The carpenters and laborers in Wilmington may, and do, dress in coveralls; they change shirts possibly once a week; they wear coarse, unshined shoes; they enjoy the lower rentals of the rural districts.

The clerical worker in Chicago, if he is to hold his job, must have a clean shirt every day; he must wear a white collar; there must be a crease in his trousers; his shoes must be kept cleaned and shined; he must pay the much higher rentals of the city. His income will average about one-sixth of that of the carpenter at Wilmington.

To meet the ever-increasing demand of taxes and labor, and to continue to operate, business and industry have been forced to economize in every possible way. The white collar man has paid the bill. He is the “forgotten man” of today.

Right in keeping with the spirit of spring, “Flapper Fanny,” popular newspaper feature star, has a brand-new wardrobe. And what an outlay of wearing apparel it is. An evening gown, an afternoon dress, a spring suit, a warm weather coat, some lounging pajamas and a printed chiffon dress.

No wonder the young lady is tickled. And you should be tickled, too, for “Flapper Fanny” wants you to color her costumes. Hence we are going to give them to you in the form of “Flapper Fanny” paper dolls . . . a trim little figure of “Flapper Fanny” and six costumes.

All you need do, is borrow mother’s scissors, and get out your colored crayons . . . then cut out and color “Flapper Fanny” and all of her garments. First, paste the above figure on cardboard, and cut out carefully. Fold the standard on the dotted line and paste the smaller section to the back of the doll.

Next, color “Flapper Fanny’s” cheeks pink, and pick out the colors you like best for the garment she is wearing, and for her evening gown. Now, try the gown on the young lady. Then watch for another spring costume, tomorrow.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 9, 1936

‘Flapper Fanny’ Picks Out Striking Afternoon Gown

IN the spring a young girl’s fancy . . . if she togs out in an afternoon dress such as this one, which “Flapper Fanny” picked as part of her spring outfit. It surely lends itself to color Nave blue skirt, red patent leather belt, red kerchief and yellow blouse for instance. But, use your own judgment. Just get out your crayons and color the dress as you see fit. Then try it on your “Flapper Fanny” paper doll. Tomorrow we will give you “Flapper Fanny’s” spring suit.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 10, 1936

This New Spring Suit Just Suits ‘Flapper Fanny’

NOTHING suits a girl in the spring better than a nice, new spring suit. “Flapper Fanny” is proud of this one . . . and can you blame her? Very neatly tailored, we’d say, and very fitting as part of “Flapper Fanny’s” spring outfit. Imagine how nice it would look colored blue, with a yellow blouse. Or, maybe you can think of a better color scheme. Color the garment any way you wish . . . then try it on your “Flapper Fanny” paper doll. And watch for “Flapper Fanny’s” spring coat. It will appear tomorrow.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 11, 1936

‘Flapper Fanny’s’ New Coat Is Last word in Style

CLASS will tell. This spring coat, for example. It’s classy, and it tells you that “Flapper Fanny” used rare judgment in picking it as part of her spring outfit. We can imagine the garment in several colors . . . gray, for instance, with a splash of color on the flowers at the neck. Perhaps you prefer green, or blue. Crayon the coat to suit yourself. Then slip it on your “Flapper Fanny” paper doll. Oh-o-o! We just peeked into “Flapper Fanny’s” closet and found a beautiful afternoon dress. It will appear tomorrow.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 13, 1936

This Printed Chiffon Dress Becomes ‘Flapper Fanny’

ON a Sunday afternoon . . . or any afternoon, for that matter . . . who is the girl who doesn’t like to step out in a smart, bright new spring dress? Well . . . it isn’t “Flapper Fanny!” She loves even the thought of it. That’s why this dress was included in her spring outfit. It is printed chiffon, and what an opportunity for color. Dots of green, violet, blue and yellow are certain to be attractive. It should be real fun coloring this dress with your crayons. The final costume in “Flapper Fanny’s” spring outfit . . . lounging pajamas . . . will appear tomorrow.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 14, 1936

Lounging Pajama Complete ‘Flapper Fanny’s’ Outfit

“FLAPPER FANNY” is very proud of the lounging pajamas she picked to complete her spring outfit. And rightly so, we think. They look the last word in comfort . . . and that’s a comforting thought. Imagine them in aquamarine crepe. Or, perhaps your imagination runs to some other color. Crayon them as you please. And then, with the five other garments, you have “Flapper Fanny’s” complete spring outfit. Try each one on the young lady and see in which one you think she looks best.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 15, 1936

* * * * *

A New Feature

Flapper Fanny Says

Begins in The News today. It is a two column cartoon which will contain a trite saying each day.

Racine, Wis. — There’s more than one Boots of “Boots and Her Buddies” fame in Racine and both can fly an airplane.

One exists in the comic strip of Edgar Martin, NEA Service artist which is published daily in the Racine Times-Call. The other is Miss Charlotte Johnson, 20, blond winner of several beauty contests who found in the pen-and-ink Boots her inspiration to be an aviator — or should we say “aviatrix?”

When Boots of the comic strip began learning to fly recently, Charlotte decided that she would do the same thing. She had driven an auto since she was 11 years old, but she had never been in an airplane before

Now, according to Ed Hedeen, who runs the aviation school here, Charlotte is one of his most accomplished student-flyers.

“I decided that if Boots could learn to fly a plane I could learn to fly one, too,” explains Miss Johnson. “Really, it isn’t nearly as difficult as I thought it would be.”

Some day she may quit her job as telephone operator and take up aviation as a profession (aviation helps those who want to rise in the world, you know) but just now Miss Johnson flies for the fun of it.

But nobody calls her Miss Johnson, nor even Charlotte, any more. To everybody now she’s “Boots” — nothing else but.

“Boots,” the air-minded heroine of Artist Edgar Martin’s popular Evening Huronite’s comic strip, has a counterpart in real life. She is pretty Olivia Matthews, 19, above, of Dedham, Mass. Just like Boots, this comely blonde debutante has forsaken the life of a social butterfly to go in for aviation in a serious way. Her first solo flight was made not long ago from a snow-covered field with a plane equipped with skis. Here you see her, in mechanics’ garb, going over her plane at the East Boston Airport. Notice the “Boots smile.”

Evening Huronite (Huron, South Dakota) Mar 29, 1929

RUTH IS A HEROINE TO HER KID BROTHER

Home Town Folks Wonder What Will Come Next; Husband Taught Her to Fly.

Anniston, Ala., Nov. 11 — “Ruth is a mighty smart girl and all that, but the young lady has just a little bit more nerve than is good for her.”
So says Oscar Elder, father of the young aviatrix who became the nation’s heroine through her daring attempt to fly across the Atlantic.

But Mrs. Elder, who has always been “Mom” to the young flyer, rushes to her daughter’s defense with”

“Now, Dad, you mustn’t say that, Ruth is is all right! She’s the finest daughter in the world, and she’s the greatest little woman ever, even if I am her own mother and say it.”

And so says the entire Elder family, down to her youngest brother. And when a kid brother will admit that his older sister is a good scout — well, you must admit she really is.

“Yes, sir!” chimes in Hughey, who is 15. “Boots is a whale of a girl. Gee, she must have had fun on that trip.”

“Boots,” be it known, is the name by which everybody in Anniston calls Ruth Elder.

Lyle Womack, Ruth’s husband, who is now in Panama with a power company, started Ruth on her career as a flyer.

His business made it necessary for him to do a good deal of flying, and frequently he took Ruth with him, so that she soon felt quite at home in an airplane.

Womack and Ruth were in Lakeland, Fla., shortly after Lindbergh’s flight. With Ed Cornell, wealthy Lakeland business man, and other friends, they were discussing the flight.

“Gee, I’d sure like to be the first woman to fly across,” said Ruth.

Cornell, who owned a pleasure plane, took her at her word and offered to find financial backing if she were serious about it. She agreed at once.

The very next morning Ruth Elder appeared at the Lakeland flying field with Captain George Haldeman, World War flyer and Cornell’s personal pilot, as her instructor.

Haldeman taught her to fly and the rest is well known.

Lyle Womack is Ruth’s second husband. Her first marriage, which ended unhappily, was the result of a high school romance. While attending school in Birmingham, Ala., she met Claude Moody.

Her parents didn’t like Moody, and the two eloped. A short time later, Ruth sued for divorce and got a decree on the grounds of cruelty and violence.

A few months after that she met Womack. Womack is something of an adventurer himself. He has traveled all over the world and is at present on a job that keeps him in Panama, where he and Ruth lived for more than a year.

Now that Ruth’s latest stunt has had a happy ending, the Elder family with all the rest of Anniston, is sitting back, breathing a sigh of relief — and wondering just what “Boots” Elder will think of doing next.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Nov 11, 1927

*****

UPDATE: This “Boots and Her Buddies” comic strip in from 1940, and mentions being “air-minded,” which is also used in the Olivia Matthews 1929 article.

THINGS ARE PICKING UP

*****

Times Signal (Zanesville, Ohio) Jun 20, 1940

Isn’t it a wow! Ever see a smarter bob than that? Well, you can take it from us, girls, that Boots Bob is going to be the real thing this summer. Men who dictate hair styles say that Edgar Martin, the artist who draws “Boots and Her Buddies,” has fashioned the niftiest hair cut they’ve seen in many a day. For other views of it turn to the strip on page 11.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 13, 1926

Remember when the girls wore mattesses tucked under their hair? Remember the old stuff about “woman’s crowning glory?” Well, just show Grandma this strip. What a laugh she’ll get!

A hundred years ago the lady of fashion piled her hair in a pyramid and buried all the jewels of King Tut in it. When she had an eight o’clock date she and her maids started in on the coiffure about noon.

A generation or two later milady took the pearls out of her hair and put them about her neck. She pulled her tresses down tight and then gathered up the loose ends in a Parker House roll and fastened it with a thousand hairpins, more or less.

And then “the girl with the curl” came into vogue. That was long before the day of Mary Pickford too. Some girls had natural curls and some didn’t and many a long hour was spent in making unnatural curls look natural.

If you really want a laugh, dig out the old family photographs and gaze on the ostermoors of twenty years ago. Remember how the girls used artificial hair to construct those wobbly mountains atop their domes? And then came those wire rats, things that looked like large window shade springs that allowed the air to get to the scalp.

But now look at the latest. It’s the “Boots Bob.” It was created by Edgar Martin, who draws “Boots and Her Buddies,” the most artistic illustrated strip in the world. No hair pins. No nets. No rats. Just simple, solid comfort for the modern girl. Yessir, the world is growing better.

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 13, 1926

Well, Folks — How Do You Like Me Now?

Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, Michigan) Apr 13, 1926

*****

UPDATE: I forgot I wanted to add this “Boots” and Empress Eugenie article here because it sort of ties in with the influential hair styles:

Several papers ran the above picture, but the Indiana Evening Gazette (maybe others, too) included this interesting Empress Eugenie article:

Who Is Empress Eugenie,Who Sets Styles Today?

BY NEA Service

Empress Eugenie, whose name designates the “Empress Eugenie hat” — that saucy trifle that young things from Maine to California are perching over their right eyelids — has become such a figure within a fortnight that even mere men prick up their ears when her name is mentioned.

She is threatening a sartorial war. “Back to Victorian modesty and the old-fashioned virtues’ ” is the prediction which Eugenie millinery has called forth.

“Back to the styles and manners of grandma’s day, for fashions always bring a recreation in manners.”

Think so?

Here’s a thumb nail sketch of the Empress Eugenie:

She was born of humble parentage in Granada, Spain, in 1826 and at 26 married Emperor Louis Napoleon.

She never wore a gown twice.

She was alternately flirtatious and religious.

She quarreled frequently with her husband and after a particularly violent disagreement when he refused to increase her allowance, sold part of the crown jewels.

She favored gowns containing 1100 years of material.

She loved excitement and was known as a fearless horsewoman.

She declared “Husbands are worth exactly nothing at all.”

She gave entertainments that were the talk of Europe for their extravagance.

Until extreme old age she dyed her hair and threatened to color it green if her children voiced their objections.

She almost always wore a small, stiff derby type of hat tilted over one eye with long plumes on either side.

These hats — worn at a coquettish angle — were responsible for the origin of the familiar phrase “setting your cap” for a suitor.

Empress Eugenie at the height of her fame dictated fashions for the entire civilized world. She was known as one of Europe’s most famous beauties and stories and legends about her are numerous. A contemporaneous volume states, “She loved excitement and dissipation but was discrete. She gave her heart often but always took it back. No one was bold enough to question her taste or depart from her style decrees.”

After all, was Empress Eugenie so slow?

Indiana Evening Gazette (Indiana, Pennsylvania) Aug 27, 1931

*****

“Boots” as a role model:

BOOTS IS A GOOD KID

Boots is one of the most popular girls in this part of California, judging from the comments we get from N.-H. readers. This sprightly young girl, who trips lightly through the top strip of the coming page daily, has so many friends that we believe a little about her private life would be acceptable.

Boots doesn’t smoke.

She has never been seen taking a nip out of a pocket flask or anything else.

She has lots of boy friends, but she doesn’t engage in petting parties.

Edgar Martin, who knows her better than does anyone else, swears she has never been kissed.

An unusual girl. But a fine daily companion for the girls and boys who turn first to the comic page of the N-H every day.